Alph lay sprawled amidst the wreckage of the pantry, the air thick with fine flour dust that coated his lungs and turned his frantic breaths into ragged coughs. White powder settled over the jagged splinters of the shattered door, masking the dark blood beginning to seep from the corner of his mouth.

  A white-hot spike of agony lanced through his side with every heartbeat. It wasn't the dull ache of a bruise; it was the sharp, grinding friction of bone against bone. The mace had found its mark, snapping a rib like a dry twig. Black spots danced at the edges of his vision, and for a moment, the world tilted, threatening to pull him into a cold, dark unconsciousness.

  A heavy, rhythmic scraping sound pulled him back.

  Skree-clink. Skree-clink.

  The metal head of the mace dragged across the stone floor, carving a shallow groove through the dust and grit. The bodyguard stepped through the ruin of the doorframe, his massive frame blocking out the light from the hallway. He moved with a slow, predatory confidence, his shadow stretching long and distorted over Alph’s prone form.

  A jagged grin split the man's face, showing yellowed teeth; he looked down at Alph with the amused detachment of a butcher watching a piglet struggle.

  "Still breathing? Persistent little rat," the bodyguard chuckled, the sound deep and gravelly in the cramped space. He adjusted his grip on the mace, the heavy wooden handle creaking under his palm.

  "I’ve cracked sturdier shells than yours, pup. Most rogues realize they’re dead the second I touch them. You’re just slow on the uptake." He kicked aside a broken shelf, the wood clattering against the back wall.

  The bodyguard towered above Alph, the mace head hovering just inches from his boots.

  "Don't worry," the brute said, his voice dropping to a mock-soothing rumble. "The second hit won't hurt nearly as much as the first."

  Alph remained motionless, his eyes half-lidded as if the light were fading. He let his head loll to the side, pressing his cheek into the gritty flour-dust. To the bodyguard, he was a broken toy, a spent force waiting for the final blow.

  Inside, Alph’s mind was a storm of focused intent. He ignored the looming shadow and the rhythmic thrum of the mace head tapping the floor. He tapped into his willpower silently guiding it to invoke Nature's Mend.

  Deep beneath his skin, the jagged edges of his snapped rib vibrated. He felt the bone shards grate against his muscle, a sickening friction that sent fresh waves of nausea through him. Then, the invisible threads of the skill took hold. They acted like spectral sutures, pulling the fractured pieces back toward one another.

  The bone ground back into place with a muffled, wet click that only he could hear. Tattered muscle fibers knit together, and the internal bleeding slowed to a sluggish crawl. The agony shifted from a sharp, debilitating scream to a dull, manageable roar; he kept his breathing shallow, masking the sudden stability of his chest.

  The bodyguard stepped closer, his shadow swallowing Alph completely. He raised the mace high above his head, his muscles bunching beneath his leather vest. The heavy metal head caught the flickering light from the hallway, a dark omen of the end.

  "Should have stayed in the shadows, rat," the guard growled, his voice thick with the satisfaction of the kill.

  The mace reached the apex of its arc, a heavy silhouette against the hallway light. In that frozen heartbeat of overconfidence, the guard’s posture opened, his weight shifting entirely to his heels for the downward crush.

  Alph, with his healed body, narrowed his focus until he only registered the guard’s exposed legs and the obsidian blade's weight in his hand. He did not wait for the blow to come down, exploding from the flour-dusted wreckage; his body uncoiled with the violent grace of a spring-trap, employing the Deft Movement skill. He stayed low, a shadow skimming the grit.

  The bodyguard’s eyes widened, the yellowed grin faltering as he realized his prey was no longer broken. He tried to adjust the swing, but gravity had already claimed the iron head of the mace.

  Alph surged past the brute's reach, his movement a blur of suppressed violence. The obsidian dagger glinted in the dim light of the pantry, dark and hungry for the opening. He performed a clean slice executed with the cold calculation of a hunter.

  Alph rotated on his forefoot, his blade slicing into the back of the guard’s right knee. The razor-sharp volcanic glass cut through wool and bit into the hamstring beneath.He felt the resistance of the flesh give way, a sickening slide of stone through sinew. The man's weight undid him, providing the tension the obsidian needed to carve through the vital connection.

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  The tendon snapped with a sound like a wet bowstring.

  Before the man could even scream, Alph’s momentum carried him in a tight, lethal circle. He lashed out again, the obsidian edge catching the left thigh. He dragged the blade across the quadriceps, severing the thick muscle groups that kept the man upright.

  The results were instantaneous.

  The guard’s right leg buckled as the connection between brain and bone vanished. His left leg, shredded and useless, failed a second later. The massive overhead swing, deprived of a stable base, lurched wildly off-course. Instead of crushing Alph’s skull, the mace buried itself in the heavy oak shelving of the pantry with a splintering boom, sending jars of preserved fruit and sacks of grain cascading down.

  The brute hit the floor with a bone-jarring thud, crashing onto both knees. The roar that tore from his throat was no longer a chuckle of triumph, but a discordant howl of animal confusion and agonizing realization. He clutched at the ruin of his legs, his fingers slipping in the hot, dark spray painting the stone.

  Alph dropped to one knee behind the crippled brute, his lungs burning as he hauled in ragged, shallow breaths. The adrenaline that had sharpened his focus to a razor’s edge began to recede, leaving a hollow ache in its place.

  Tension spent, his forearms burned, fingers twitched against the dagger's grip. Coppery warmth slicked his hands, dripping from split knuckles onto the stone floor. The guard convulsed, sending fresh splatters arcing across the flagstones, each wet slap tightening the vise in Alph's chest.

  Too close. If that mace had connected, I'd be pulp on the stones. He forced his shaking hands to stay steady, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird.

  Alph lunged, his obsidian blade leveled at the bodyguard’s exposed throat. The man was a ruin of shredded muscle and snapped tendons, yet as the shadow of death loomed, his eyes didn't fill with the dull glaze of a victim. Instead, they burned with a terrifying, primal light.

  The air in the pantry curdled. A heavy, suffocating pressure slammed into Alph, thick as swamp muck and twice as cold. It was a mental wave that made his heart stutter and his knees turn to water.

  The world buckled.

  The stone walls of the manor basement bled away, replaced by the flickering firelight and chilled air of the Oakhaven meeting hall. The pantry's grain and blood smell gave way to a sharp, foul stench of blood and decay. Alph’s feet felt heavy, rooted to a floor that was suddenly slick with gore.

  No.

  A figure rose from the hall's center, emerging from a pool of bubbling crimson; Lyra's face showed porcelain cruelty, and her fingers wove a bolt of jagged, pulsating blood magic. Alph tried to scream, but he couldn't utter the sound. He saw Kael standing just a few feet away, his expression one of confused innocence. The blood bolt shrieked through the air; the boy he had failed to save disintegrated into a mist of red.

  The scene shifted with a sickening lurch.

  The cold of the hall vanished, replaced by the fiery streets of Stoneford. The ground beneath Alph’s boots trembled. A shadow loomed over him, blotting out the sun—the Flesh Behemoth. It was a mountain of stitched meat and mindless hunger. Beneath its massive, club-like fist lay Sergeant Sal, his armor crumpled like parchment.

  "Run, kid!" Sal’s voice was a wet gurgle, his eyes wide and fixed on Alph as the fist descended.

  The sound of the impact was a sickening crunch that vibrated through Alph’s very soul. Every failure, every life lost while he hesitated, rose up like a tide of black ink. The bodyguard’s dying survival instinct had conjured a nightmare of his own making, a gallery of his ghosts designed to shatter his will and force him to flee into the dark.

  Deep within his mind, the Adamant Will triggered by itself. It was a silent detonation of clarity that acted as a psychological fortress, a cold tide that swept through the nightmares of Oakhaven and Stoneford.

  The nightmares broke apart. Alph's eyes focused on the blood-splashed pantry. The bodyguard's gaze, wide with the desperate hope of a man who had just unleashed his final gambit, locked onto Alph's.

  The fear the brute expected evaporated like smoke.

  Alph sharpened his gaze, fixing on the man's neck pulse. He stepped through the mental attack's remaining pressure as if walking through a cobweb. His movement was a singular, purposeful lunge that ignored the past's phantom smells.

  The obsidian dagger dived.

  The dagger's tip found the soft hollow of the throat, sinking in with a wet, resistance-free slide. Alph felt the vibration of the blade severing the windpipe and the hot, rhythmic spray of the carotid artery as it painted his forearm. He held the grip firm, twisting the blade once to ensure the work was done.

  The bodyguard’s hands clawed feebly at Alph’s jacket, his mouth working in a silent, bubbly red foam, before the light in his eyes simply went out. Alph withdrew the blade and stepped back. He watched the massive frame slump against the broken shelving, the man’s head lolling at an unnatural angle.

  He breathed heavily, rhythmically, and heard the steady drip-pat of blood hitting the flagstones after the kill.

  He wiped the obsidian edge on the guard's tunic, his hands finally ceasing their tremor. The sorrow of the hallucinations lingered like a bitter aftertaste, a reminder of the ghosts he carried, but he shoved the feeling into the dark corners of his mind. He couldn't afford the luxury of grief.

  The clatter of the mace, the splintering of the pantry and the bodyguard's howl must have echoed through the manor. Servants would be scurrying to alert the guards from outside. The clock was ticking, and the debt remained unpaid. Pavel was still breathing, likely hiding behind a locked door while his subordinates died in the dark.

  "Not over," Alph whispered to the silence.

  He straightened his posture, ignoring the dull ache in his chest. Justice required more than a dead bodyguard; it required the head of the man who had discarded a human life like a sack of refuse. With a final look at the corpse, he turned away from the wreckage of the pantry. He stepped across the blood-slicked floor and moved toward the basement stairs.